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A School Assignment System for 2016 or the 1960s? - SF Public School MomSF Public School Mom : A School Assignment System for 2016 or the 1960s? Guest post by Julie Roberts-Phung [Julie Roberts-Phung is a founding member of the San Francisco Families Union . This is a report back from the SFUSD Ad Hoc Student Assignment System Committee meeting November 29, 2016.] At a moment when President-Elect

Mike Pence's Voucher Program in Indiana Was a Windfall for Religious Schools | Mother Jones : Mike Pence's Voucher Program in Indiana Was a Windfall for Religious Schools Creationists, Catholics and a madrasa all received taxpayer funding. One of Vice President-elect Mike Pence's pet projects as governor of Indiana was expanding school choice vouchers, which allow public money to pay for private

How Much Damage Could Trump Do to Public Education? : Will Trump Overhaul Public Education? From privatization to civil rights, his Department of Education could transform the American system. ast week, President-elect Donald Trump announced a strongly ideological pick for secretary of education: Michigan philanthropist Betsy DeVos. Unlike the current secretary, John King, or the previous one, Ar

Did a California Charter School Group Fund an Effort to Overthrow the Turkish Government? | L.A. Weekly : Did a California Charter School Group Fund an Effort to Overthrow the Turkish Government? More than a dozen times in a single year, Yunus Avcu, a 31-year-old man from Turkey, boarded a commercial flight to John Wayne Airport in Santa Ana carrying a laptop case loaded with cash — between $5,00

Reading Betsy DeVos: All About Children? | educarenow : Reading Betsy DeVos: All About Children? Now that Betsy DeVos has been named the national Secretary of Education, We’re going to have to get used to articles like this , “Betsy DeVos is All About Children,” from Ingrid Jacques of the Detroit News. But that doesn’t mean we have to believe anything about them. Let me start with my shock that s

Feds: South Carolina law compounds 'school-to-prison pipeline' problem | News | aikenstandard.com : Feds: South Carolina law compounds 'school-to-prison pipeline' problem COLUMBIA — Federal authorities have weighed in on a lawsuit challenging South Carolina's "disturbing schools" law, arguing that the vague statute ends up disproportionately landing minority students and those with disabilities i

Julie Vassilatos: Betsy DeVos and the Zombie Apocalypse | Diane Ravitch's blog : Julie Vassilatos: Betsy DeVos and the Zombie Apocalypse Julie Vassilatos, an activist parent of children in the Chicago public schools, writes here about Betsy DeVos. She begins by offering a round up of some of the best posts about DeVos. We all must get up to speed on who she is. In addition to being a fervent advo

Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: The bailout of Exelon nukes comes right out of the schools : The bailout of Exelon nukes comes right out of the schools Jobs creators -- 30 years after the nuclear meltdown, the Great Arch at Chernobyl is finally completed. Natasha Korecki in this morning's IL Playbook: It’s probably fitting that the Legislative veto session concluded Thursday with just about everyo

SDP District-Wide Surveys : School District of Philadelphia District-Wide Surveys VIEW the DATA NEW! 2015-2016 Data Available ABOUT the DISTRICT-WIDE SURVEYS The results available on this site are from surveys designed to capture feedback from The School District of Philadelphia community on five key topics related to school improvement. Because this feedback provides a more complete picture of P

Sen. Sessions once linked special education law to ‘decline in civility’ in classrooms - The Washington Post : Sen. Sessions once linked special education law to ‘decline in civility’ in classrooms Sen. Jeff Session, the Alabama Republican whom President-elect Donald Trump has tapped to be the next attorney general of the United States, once trashed a federal law that was passed to ensure student

Experts Discuss Office for Civil Rights Future Under Trump - The Atlantic : What Is the Future of the Office for Civil Rights? Experts with varying opinions weigh in on what the arm of the Department of Education could look like under Donald Trump and Betsy DeVos. In the days after the presidential election, news outlets and thousands of educators reported increases in harassment, bullying, and i

Ed Notes Online: Buying the So-called Ed Press: Bill and Melinda Drop a Half Million on Chalkbeat : Buying the So-called Ed Press: Bill and Melinda Drop a Half Million on Chalkbeat Purpose: to inform low-income parents and parents of color in Newark, Detroit, and New York about K-12 education Amount: $525,042 Sure -- to really "inform" low-income parents of color or to propagandize for ed deform

It's time for Congress to keep it's promise to our IDEA students : Congress made this promise 41 years ago…Time to keep it! All students deserve the opportunity for a great education that meets their needs and opens doors for them. Thanks to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) , all students have a right to access the support and resources they need to realize their full potent

CURMUDGUCATION: Unionizing Charters (PT. 3) : Unionizing Charters (PT. 3) So I've been working my way through the newly-launched conversation about how teacher unions and charter school fans could become BFFs. (Here are Part 1 , Part 2 , and a sort of Prelude ). After plowing through all that, I'm going to try to articulate what I think we're looking at and how I feel about it. The Need This is a

Betsy DeVos and a national system of market-based schools. The only problem would be stupid parents. | Fred Klonsky : Betsy DeVos and a national system of market-based schools. The only problem would be stupid parents. Trumps choice of Betsy DeVos as Education Secretary is a terrible one for the country’s parents and students. Naturally, for most of those who want an end to public schools and a n

Adichie’s “danger of a single story” and the Rise of Post-Truth Trumplandia | the becoming radical : Adichie’s “danger of a single story” and the Rise of Post-Truth Trumplandia In an effort to understand post-truth Trumplandia , this is one explanation: Follow Patrick Thornton ✔ @pwthornton Why coverage is so off: Journalists literally have no framework or training with how to deal with a preside

Major New Report Shows that Charters Are Too Often Parasites Weakening Host School Districts | janresseger : Major New Report Shows that Charters Are Too Often Parasites Weakening Host School Districts On Wednesday, The Economic Policy Institute published a comprehensive report by Rutgers economist Bruce Baker, Exploring the Consequences of Charter School Expansion in U.S. Cities . Reviewing Bake

A Challenge for Campbell Brown’s The 74: Publicize Your Detailed History | deutsch29 : A Challenge for Campbell Brown’s The 74: Publicize Your Detailed History In June 2015, former CNN anchor and anti-union, corporate reform pusher Campbell Brown officially launched The Seventy Four, which she describes as follows: I am excited to announce the launch of a project I’ve been working on for some tim

CURMUDGUCATION: Measuring Charter Success : Measuring Charter Success The charter business is going to boom soon. Let's imagine how we could become really successful in that industry. Let's imagine a world where schools are judged on how healthy their students are. And since overall health is a complicated metric, let's choose an easily-measured metric as a proxy. We'll say that the students' hei

Badass Teachers Association : Locally Owned and Operated: The Logical Fallacy At the Center of Trump’s Education Plans By: Cheryl Gibbs Binkley Throughout Donald Trump’s campaign and in his recent announcements he has come out swinging on education that, "There's no failed policy more in need of change than our government-run education monopoly and you know that's exactly what it is." There’s jus